Disaster Relief for Texas Dogs
Twenty-six dogs are traveling to Chicago to escape the deadly winter storms that are devastating an utterly unprepared Texas.
Each one has his or her own story of how they were left behind, or ran away, or saved from a chain or a pen. We don’t meet rescue dogs at the beginning of their story but rather a few pages in. What we don’t know about them — how it all started or what exactly they have lived through — is balanced, in a way, by what we know about ourselves. We know that we can offer them love. That we can care for them and keep them safe and warm. We know that we can meet them where they’re at and patiently go from there. If we look a little deeper, we may also see something about ourselves that is both very personal and completely universal: animals make us better people.
The winter storms that are raging across Texas have created a major crisis in animal welfare -- as well as an opportunity to rise to the occasion. Please join us in bringing life-saving relief to communities devastated by the current expansion of the polar vortex.
Temperatures have dropped below zero in a region where winter weather typically stays in the mid-fifties. In some places, over a foot of snow has fallen, and there is no means of snow removal. For the animals in rural areas, an already precarious situation has become life-threatening.
This is the same dog pictured above. Our rescue partner is still trying to convince the owner to either surrender the dog or to bring it inside.
Rural rescuers throughout the state have been working frantically to either get these animals into shelters that have indoor housing or to convince their owners to let them come inside. Unfortunately, most rural shelters only have outdoor housing for their dogs. Normally, this is not a problem as winter temperatures are more mild, but the intensity and extent of this cold front is completely beyond their means to handle.
City shelters have been taking in animals from the surrounding rural areas, but they are over capacity and the current crisis is producing even more demand. This is an emergency on par with what one sees from a major hurricane, and relief efforts are just starting.
Wright-Way Rescue was the first out-of-state shelter to offer assistance to the network of Texas rescuers scrambling to prepare for the crippling cold they knew was coming. While transporting these animals out of Texas brings ease to the congested housing at Dallas Animal Service, we are told that it has also brought a feeling of hope and relief to everyone who is working nonstop to save these lives. And this is just the first transport -- we are already working on others.
Our rescue partners are dealing with no electricity, roads that are unplowed and dangerous, empty grocery stores, and a lack of animal supplies. On top of that, they are the ones receiving the reports of animals who have already died from exposure. Yet, they continue to work together, doing their best to help the animals and their communities survive this disaster. We are doing the same. Working together, we create a lifesaving network of donors, fosters, adopters, volunteers, and supporters of all kinds. That is the gift we can give to these animals. Their gift to us is the opportunity to become a better version of ourselves.
Please support this work today.